


Iron and Fire and Sweat

by kalirush



Category: A Knight's Tale (2001)
Genre: Backstory, F/M, Family, Fluff, Original Character Death(s), Smithing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-22
Updated: 2013-12-22
Packaged: 2018-01-05 13:27:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,644
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1094380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kalirush/pseuds/kalirush
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kate learns to be a smith, to love, to grieve, and to live.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Iron and Fire and Sweat

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Vae](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vae/gifts).



> My recipient asked for backstory- how Kate learned smithing and how she met her husband. This is my take on it. Happy Yuletide, and I hope you enjoy it!

It was always hot and dark in the smithy. Kate felt safe there, tucked in a corner behind a barrel, listening to her father’s hammer strike metal. 

“Kate!” she heard her mother cry. “Kitty cat, where have you got to?”

Her father stopped hammering. “I don’t know,” he said, a smile cracking his enormous face. “Where could our Katie be?”

Kate put two hands over her mouth, trying not to laugh.

Her mother put both hands on her hips. “I don’t know either,” she said. “She’s not under the forge. And she’s not behind the anvil.”

“She’s not behind my hammer,” her father agreed, looking very puzzled. “Hmmm….”

Kate lost her fight against the giggles. Immediately, her father swooped around the barrel. “There she is!” he said, and caught her up in his enormous arms. “A smithy’s no place for a little girl, you know,” he told her.

“I like it here,” she told him.

“Well, you’ve chores back in the house, Kitty cat,” her mother said. “Give her over, John.”

Her mother perched her on her hip and carried her out of the smithy. Kate patted her mother’s round belly. “I love the smithy, mama,” she said.

Her mother hitched her higher. “I know,” she said. “But your da’s right. It’s no place for a little girl.”

Kate just leaned against her mother as they headed for the house. 

\----------------------------------------------------

Kate curled into a corner and tried to be quiet. Her father could barely hear over the ring of hammer on steel anyway, she figured.

The hammer stopped. “I see you there,” he said, sternly. 

“The chores are all finished,” she said, quickly. “I swept the hearth and floors and washed the laundry and put on a stew for supper-” She’d rushed through all of it as fast as she could, hoping she’d be able to find time to visit the smithy.

His shoulders sagged. “It’s a lot to ask you to do on your own,” he said.

She remembered her father standing with his shoulders bowed over her mother’s grave- her mother and her baby brother, who’d never drawn breath. “I can manage,” she said. “Only let me watch you here sometimes.”

He sighed, but from the side she could see the hint of a smile on his face. “Why do you love the forge so?” he asked.

“It’s pretty,” she said, rocking from her heels to her toes, the words coming out in a rush. “The fire and the metal are the prettiest things I’ve ever seen. And you can make _anything_. It’s like magic.”

Her father laughed. “An old magic,” he said. “Iron and fire and sweat.”

She nodded. “Yes,” she agreed. 

He sighed. “If the chores are done, I suppose it can’t hurt for you to watch,” he said.

\-----------------------------------------------

Kate glared at her father. “I can do it!” she argued. 

“It’s not about whether you can or not,” her father said, glaring back. He crossed his massive smith’s arms. “You’ve no need to learn smithing, much less armor smithing.”

“And it’s not about whether I’ve a need to learn it,” she pointed out, tartly. “You’ve a need for another hand in the smithy. And I can work a bellows and tend a fire as well as anyone.”

He shook his head. “The bellows requires strength of arm and stamina.”

“Oh, and we’re back to whether I can do it or not,” she said. “I dare you to let me try.”

“I won’t be dared,” he said, sighing. “The answer is no. It’ll stay no.”

She scoffed. “And what, you’ll hire another half-wit boy from Cheapside, who doesn’t know a hammer from the tongs? I’ve been watching you since I was a girl! You won’t find a better assistant.”

“You’re still a girl,” he said.

“I’m twelve!” she argued, much aggrieved. “And you haven’t found a decent apprentice in a year. So let me help.”

“Maybe I’ve let you have your head more than I should have,” he said, glumly.

“Well, it’s a bit too late to concern yourself with that now,” she said. She grinned suddenly. “If you like, I can quote you your lectures on metallurgy.”

“You weren’t supposed to be listening to those,” he said.

She smiled slyly. “I listen to everything you say.”

“Only until I find another apprentice,” he said. 

\---------------------------------------------

Adam swung the hammer hesitantly, striking the metal and skittering awkwardly off to the side. He cringed, his pale skin going even ruddier in the firelight. He was tall, but a bit skinny, as though he’d been stretched out by some great hand. His arms were still a bit thin- no smith’s arms yet.

“I know what you’re doing wrong,” Kate said.

“Let the boy figure it out himself,” her father said, gruffly.

“How would you know, anyway?” Adam snapped, nastily.

“I would know because I already know more about smithing than you’ve learned in the whole year you’ve been apprenticed,” she snapped back. Adam got on her nerves. He switched between arrogance and insecurity and she didn’t know which she liked less.

“Katie-” her father said, warningly. 

“You’re a girl,” Adam said. “You don’t know anything about it.”

She clenched her teeth, anger making her vision go sharp and her hearing go fuzzy. “Give me that hammer, and I’ll show you what I know!” she shouted.

“Kate,” her father said, firmly. “Go back to the house.”

“That’s right, shrew!” Adam said, snidely. “Go back to your washing.”

Everything went still. “What did you call my daughter?” her father said, carefully.

Adam quailed. “Sir-” he started. 

Kate walked up and snatched the hammer out of his hand. “If I can fix the ham-handed job you did on this cuisse, then _you_ can do the washing for a while,” she said. Adam opened his mouth to say something, but shut it again at a quelling glance from her father. She raised the hammer. 

She’d never actually worked metal before. She’d dreamt about it. She didn’t know how she dared do it now, but no one was stopping her. She refused to let herself think about how badly she might fail at this. She’d handled the hammers until she knew them like they were extensions of her hands. She’d watched her father as long as she could remember, until she knew the details of his motions in her sleep. She’d seen a hundred cuisses formed on this anvil, and she could have traced their shape with her eyes closed. She breathed, and brought the hammer down.

The hammer struck metal solidly. She was strong from years of toting water and working the bellows, and she brought all that strength to bear on her task. She raised the hammer again and again, stretching the metal to be heavier in the front where it would take the brunt of an attack, and lighter where the body was more protected. Once she had the shape right, she switched hammers and began rolling the edges on the anvil.

Her father coughed. “Katie,” he said, and she looked up. “Let me have a look.”

She handed it over for his inspection, her stomach fluttering. _Watching_ wasn’t the same as _doing_. She thought the shape looked right, that the finish was good, that the metal was the right thickness, but-

He nodded. “This is good,” he admitted. “How did you learn this?”

She felt suddenly shy. “I’ve watched you since I can remember,” she said.

Her father stood speechless for a moment. “Our family have always been smiths,” he said, slowly. “As far back as I know. But I’ve no son to pass it on to.”

She flushed. “I can finish the edges,” she said, roughly. 

Her father looked back at the cuisse. “Fine,” he said. “Let’s see how you manage the rounded edge.”

“Does this mean I have to do the washing?” Adam asked, in a small voice.

\-------------------------------------------------

Adam stood in the doorway and watched her. 

“Do you like lurking over people?” she asked, tartly, reaching for a hammer with a smaller peen.

“Oh, I’m just trying to learn a thing or two from the master,” he said, grinning. 

“You’ve got soot on your face,” she told him, rolling her eyes.

“This is a smithy,” he said. “We’ve all got soot on our faces. But it looks fetching on you.”

She shifted the knee joint she was working on to a narrower section of the anvil. “Now you’re just trying to sweet talk me,” she said.

He stepped behind her, laying a kiss on her neck, his massive arms closing around her waist. He made her feel light-headed. And tingly. She shifted her neck to give him more access. “You’re lucky I’m cold-working this right now,” she murmured. “Or you’d be like to get yourself singed.”

He nuzzled the spot just below her ear, and she shivered. “Oh, I paid attention when I came in. I know better than to get near you when you’re forging hot steel.”

“But not enough sense not to romance your master’s daughter,” she pointed out. He answered her with a kiss, and she leaned into it, breathing in the scent of sweat and soot and the peculiar sweet musk that was Adam and no other. 

And then, in a flash, he was across the room, trying to look innocent. Her father, striding into the smithy, did not look impressed. “You’re meant to be down at the docks, picking up our supplies,” he said.

“Yes, Master,” Adam said, looking chastened. He glanced back at Kate, and hurried out the door, toward the stable.

Kate looked resolutely down at her knee joint. Her father did not leave.

“Katie,” he sighed. 

She looked up. 

“Despite what you may think,” he said, sardonically, “I’m neither blind nor an idiot.”

She blushed. “I- we-”

He sighed again. “He’ll make journeyman in six months, if he finishes his piece when he ought. A journeyman might marry, if his wife doesn’t mind travel.”

Her eyes grew wide. “Do you think-”

“Do you want him?” her father asked. “Because if you don’t, I’ll show him the wrong end of a hammer, if you need me to.”

“No!” she said. “I- yes! Do you think he means to ask?”

“He’d better,” her father growled. “Or I’ll have to have some words with him over how he’s carrying on.”

\-------------------------------------------

“Fluting gives it more strength, you see?” she argued, drawing furiously on the tablet. “I saw it in the sword competitions yesterday. The shape of it repels a blade like nothing else.”

Adam took the tablet, looking at the diagram inscribed in it. “Fine enough if you’re only fighting against sword,” he said. “But it’d catch a lance or an arrow.”

She considered. “It might let you control where a strike lands, a bit. And you could reinforce the valleys- make the steel a little thicker there, so it’s harder to pierce.”

“I think it’d only work if you can make the steel harder,” he said.

“Do the two of you actually intend to be married?” her father said, interrupting them. “Because the church is still across town, and the priest is waiting.” He sounded annoyed, but he was smiling. 

She blushed. “I was just thinking about a new design-” she started. 

Adam grinned. “Sorry, Master,” he said. “She’s always distracting me.”

“You were born distracted,” she countered.

“Oh, what a creature is Woman, that she leads Man astray,” Adam said, good-naturedly. 

Her father rolled his eyes. “To the carriage,” he said. “And mind you leave that design behind. You’ve no need to be working on your wedding day, whatever my heathen daughter may think.”

Adam held out a hand to her- rough and calloused and strong. A smith’s hand. “Will you marry me, Kitty-cat?” he asked. “Or have you changed your mind?”

She took his hand. “I could stand to marry you,” she said. “Provided you give the fluting a try.”

He grinned like he’d never stop.

\--------------------------------------------------

Kate struck steel, glaring at no one.

“He was an ass,” Adam said, into her ear, “but his money will spend.”

“I’m no less a smith than you,” she snapped. 

“I know it,” he said, leaning on the tent pole. “And you know it, and your father knows it. But he doesn’t know you, and he’s never met a woman smith. Ignore him.”

She turned the gorget she was working on, considering the scalloped edge. “He’s a small-minded fool,” she snarled. “And he’s _French_.” She struck the metal again.

He laughed. “True enough,” he said. “He doesn’t deserve armor as good as you make.”

“Ha,” she said, “But you’ll tell him you made it entire, else he’ll refuse to pay.”

“So I will,” he said, grinning. “But it’ll be your maker’s mark on it, and it’s not my fault if he’s too dull to notice.”

She laid her hammer down and turned the gorget around with the tongs. “I wish we didn’t need his money.”

“Alas for the price of charcoal,” Adam agreed. “Speaking of which, I’d best head off in search of supplies.”

She set the gorget over the fire, watching it carefully. “Do you ever wish you had a proper wife?” she asked, blackly. “Someone to look pretty and darn your socks?”

He laughed. “I met you when I was thirteen and an idiot, and you were already a hot-tempered girl with a smith’s hands. Even then, I knew that there’d never be another woman for me.”

“Well,” she argued. “I don’t think you knew it right then. You were such an ass to me at first.”

“Haven’t you ever heard that idiot boys are the worst to the girls they like the most?” he asked.

“Good thing you’re not an idiot boy any more,” she said. “Now you’d best get off to the charcoal sellers.” 

He leaned in for a kiss, and then sauntered, laughing, out of the tent.

\--------------------------------------------------

Kate thought she’d like to weep, if she could only find the time for tears. Adam moaned and tossed in his bed. She went from her father’s bed to her husband’s, mopping both their foreheads with cool water and changing their soiled linens. Her eyes burned and her throat hurt- whether from suppressed tears or the beginning of her own illness she did not know. 

“Kate?” Adam murmured, reaching out a hand. His large frame was sunken and sallow, his grip weaker than she had ever known it. “Kitty-cat?”

“I’m here,” she said, her voice cracking. 

“You’re beautiful,” he said, his eyes glazed and his breathing labored. “You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever known.”

“I know,” she whispered. “But then, you’re half-blind from forge sparks, so what do you know?”

“I know everything,” he said. “And I know you.”

She held his hand.

\--------------------------------------------------

It wasn’t fair. Two strong men dead of influenza and only her left in a smithy that she couldn’t afford to keep. There were two new graves next to the old one. Mother, father and husband all dead. She blinked back tears. 

_Hope guides me_ , she heard Adam’s voice say, as he had said so many times. _It is what gets me through the day and especially the night._

She took the best of the tools. She took her apron and a store of iron. She took an anvil and her husband’s journey sack. She took the shingle that marked her as a smith. She took twenty years of watching her father forge and hammer steel. She took ten years of arguing with and competing with and coming to love her husband. She took their years of traveling together as journeymen. She took the year that the three of them had lived together in a shop that should have passed to the children she’d never have, and their children after that. She took the magic of iron and fire and sweat.

She hefted the sack on her back, and went to find her future.


End file.
